Thursday, March 1, 2018

Mankind hasn’t changed a bit over the millennia; the senseless hatred and violence and killings continue

My husband and I just saw a movie entitled, "Hostiles". Set in 1892, Hostiles tells the story of a legendary war-weary Army Captain who, after stern resistance, reluctantly agrees to escort a dying Cheyenne war chief and his family back to tribal lands. Making the harrowing and perilous journey from Fort Berringer, an isolated Army outpost in New Mexico, to the grasslands of Montana, the former rivals encounter a young widow whose husband and three children had just been murdered by several Comanche thugs on the plains.

“Hostiles” is a story of whites killing reds, reds killing whites, reds killing reds, and whites killing whites, with incomprehensible and senseless hatred on all sides. Regardless, together, the small unit of soldiers and their Cheyenne prisoner and his family, end up joining forces to overcome the punishing landscape, hostile Comanche attacks and vicious white outliers they encounter along the way.

In the end, the captain and the old, dying chief shake hands as kindred spirits, in the knowledge that both sides have been through hell. (And no, I didn’t give away the end!)

"Hostiles" is an excellent but depressing movie that not only shows the unimaginable hardships and horrors of the old “Wild West”; but it also reveals that man NEVER changes. Today, we still live among cut-throats who have no regard for human life and care nothing for anyone except themselves. (In some cases, they don't even care about themselves as evidenced by "suicide bombers.") Men everywhere still terrorize, make war upon, and murder each other because they simply cannot get along.

All the qualities YHWH hates in mankind are alive and thriving in our fallen world.. Nothing has changed since the day Cain killed Abel….

Jeremiah 17: 9 "The heart is more deceitful than anything else and mortally sick. Who can fathom it? 10 I, ADONAI, search the heart; I test inner motivations; in order to give to everyone what his actions and conduct deserve." (CJB)

Proverbs 6:16-19 There are six things that the Lord hates, seven that are an abomination to him: haughty eyes, a lying tongue, and hands that shed innocent blood, a heart that devises wicked plans, feet that make haste to run to evil, a false witness who breathes out lies, and one who sows discord among brothers. (ESV)

Proverbs 8:13 The fear of the Lord is hatred of evil. Pride and arrogance and the way of evil and perverted speech I hate. (ESV)

1 John 3:15 Everyone who hates his brother is a murderer, and you know that no murderer has eternal life abiding in him. (ESV)

1 John 2: 9 Anyone who claims to be in this light while hating his brother is still in the dark. 10 The person who keeps loving his brother remains in the light, and there is nothing in him that could make him trip. 11 But the person who hates his brother is in the dark - yes, he is walking in the dark, and he doesn't know where he is going, because the darkness has blinded his eyes. (ESV)

1 John 2:15 Do not love the world or the things of the world. If someone loves the world, then love for the Father is not in him; 16 because all the things of the world - the desires of the old nature, the desires of the eyes, and the pretensions of life - are not from the Father but from the world. 17 And the world is passing away, along with its desires. But whoever does God's will remains forever. (CJB)

No - man has never changed; nor has he learned from his mistakes! Wars and terrorist acts and all manner of rude, lewd and crude behavior will ONLY come to the proverbial screeching halt when Y'shua returns. Until then, it will simply be "business as usual."